I Lost A Friend (I Love You And It's Hard To Move On)
by seeyouontuesday
Summary: Is this what she wanted to leave behind? A cruel joke, for sure, but he guesses maybe that's what she wanted. Pieces of broken people attract other parts, he supposes. (Post Reichenbach, Fem!Lock)


_**I Lost A Friend (I Love You and It's Hard To Move On)**_

It's raining. For the first time in a very long time, it rains, which is unusual for London, but it makes sense to John, because everything hurts, for fuck's sake, but better the rain reflect his mood than actually show it, so he watches and he hurts.

John's tired.

The rain pours.

"Why today?" His therapist (previous therapist, he supposes) asks softly, and he knows she means no ill intent, but he feels irritated at the question, angry that she didn't know, so he frowns and looks down at his shoe.

"D'you want to hear me say it?" John responds quietly.

"Eighteen months since our last appointment," Ella ignores his question, and John really wishes she didn't.

"D'you read the papers?" He asks, letting his anger seep into his voice, and he still remains quiet.

Ella's silent for a second, then shrugs and leans forward in her chair. "Sometimes."

John offers a pained smile. "Mmm, and you watch telly?" A brief silence as he takes a breath and reminds himself to not lash out. "You know why I'm here," John tries to finish, but the words get caught in his throat at the end and he chokes. He looks back down, and tries very very hard not to cry right then and there.

"What happened, John?" Ella asks again gently.

John closes his eyes and tries to control himself, but then he forces himself to look her in the eyes again, and he can't imagine what he looks like to her.

Is this what she wanted to leave behind? A cruel joke, for sure, but he guesses maybe that's what she wanted. Whatever was left of her towards the end.

Pieces of broken people attract other parts, he supposes.

"Sher-" John has to stop and clear his throat, his voice breaking, and tries to not think about her falling off the rooftop, about the thud she made when she hit the pavement-

"My...best friend," he empathizes, because she is and he loves her and she can't be-

"Sherlock Holmes," he sniffs and his voice breaks.

"...she's dead."

The thunder rumbles and drowns out his sobs.

~X~

He can't bring himself to move out quite yet. It's been weeks since the funeral, and John knows he can't live in their (_his_ now, his flat) sad, tired flat forever, it'd be disrespectful to her, but he hasn't been able to bring himself to move and look at other places. So he just sits in his room and watches and stares and tries not to listen to the roaring silence in the walls.

He didn't notice the silence before. The flat used to be far too loud with her to notice the silence, everything from gunshots to the wall to the violin at ungodly hours in the morning to inconsistent ramblings to herself about whatever and he loved her for it, he really truly did-

But it was quiet now.

Somehow, the quiet was louder.

The room gets darker as the day goes on and John continues to stare and watch until he happens to look at the clock and it's far too early for him to still be awake. He lets out a soft groan, and he's not sure what comes over him, but he stands for what feels like the first time in ages and shuffles, slowly but surely, into their (his) living room.

Everything is still the same. John hasn't bothered to move anything around, and Mrs. Hudson doesn't come in to clean ("She always used to make such a fuss about the dusting," Mrs. Hudson tries to say something in order to make him feel better, and it almost does) so everything still looks the same, just less tidy than before, but it's so familiar, and for a brief second, John expects to see her facing out the window with a cup of tea in her hand.

But she's not.

She's gone.

John hesitates for another second, then shuffles over to his chair.

He sits.

Everything still smells like her.

John breaks, and not for the first time, he cries silently in his chair.

Later that morning, John Watson makes a phone call to a man renting out a flat in Tower Hill and hopes it'll be louder there than in the silence here.

~X~

Five months after the funeral, John goes out and tries to move on.

He's at a club in a part of town he doesn't know with his alcoholic sister and he still hurts, so he gets drunker than he's ever been before and he dances with a girl that doesn't have a name.

She wanted to dance with him, in his defense. And he's not denying that she wasn't attractive, she's just not Sher- his type. She's not his type. She's slightly shorter than him, and probably significantly younger than him, and she's got neon red hair that glows in the light of the club, and she's clearly into him, so he says fuck it and he dances.

She asks if she can kiss him.

He tells her she can do whatever she wants.

Later, after he wakes up from the sound of Sherlock's body hitting the pavement ringing in his ears and remembers he went home with the girl in the club, he realizes that yes, he's not going to move on.

~X~

He met Mary almost a year after the funeral. And he hated that he was pretty sure he loved her.

It wasn't like there was anything wrong with her, she was nice enough and she cared for him, legitimately cared for him. She supported him, made sure he was doing better than he had been for the last year of his godawful life, she was absolutely the best he could've ever asked for.

She just wasn't Sherlock.

Because Sherlock was Sherlock, and he had loved her so so much, and he tells Mary this at three in the morning when he wakes up from another nightmare, and he feels so incredibly terrible for sobbing in her arms about a woman who was dead and didn't care, but Mary just shushes him and cradles him in her arms and tells him everything's going to be okay.

Mary listens to all of John's stories about Sherlock. She reads the blog that hasn't been active in a year, she laughs at the anecdotes John chooses to share, she listens to John try to make sense of why she left him, why she lied to him about everything.

"Maybe she didn't," Mary suggests one day over her kitchen table.

John furrows his brow, then looks up at her over his tea. "Hm?"

"Well," Mary starts gently, and reaches over to take John's hand. "As tough and awkward as she sounds, it did seem like she loved you enough to let you into her...odd brain of her's. She was smart enough to know you would've gotten hurt in the end, so she just tried to..soften the blow, I suppose."

John sighs, then squeezes Mary's hand. "Maybe," he says softly. "It still hurts though."

Mary smiles, then squeezes back. "I know, love," she whispers back. "It never really stops hurting."

Later, John thinks to himself, that if Sherlock can ever forgive him, he loves Mary Morstan, and he's ready to move on now.

~X~

It's been almost two years since the funeral, and John Watson is better. He's moved on (for the most part), and yes it still hurts sometimes, but he lives in a nice little flat with his wonderful girlfriend, and he has a stable job that doesn't involve anymore dead bodies, and he can't remember the last time he had a nightmare about her, so John thinks he's doing better than most.

He's happy.

He hurts sometimes, but for the most part, he's happy.

And then there's a knock on the door and a light tap on the buzzer, and John opens his door to see a tall, tired girl with wild curls standing on his doorstep.

For a second, he feels nothing.

And then Sherlock Holmes offers him a small, exhausted smile.

And all the hurt John Watson's been feeling for two years hits him all at once.

* * *

**A/N:**

\- a reupload of a previous work. apparently i "violated community guidelines" :) not a big deal, just... frustrated.

\- inspired by the song _I Lost A Friend_, by FINNEAS

\- mostly written to vent, but criticism is always always always appreciated


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